Once in a great while you put on a CD by an artist you've never heard of before and time stops. The voice is new, yet timeless. The lyrics are all original yet feel immediately familiar. And the melodies carry the easy groove. This is the story of Eilen (rhymes with feelin') Jewell and this is her debut record. Jewell's heart-aching hushed style and intimate grasp of roots music are revealed in the CD's provocative, melodic originals and timeless country and blues classics. For fans of Lucinda Williams and Gillian Welch, this is a rousing and confident tour de force.
Boise-born and Boston-based, Eilen Jewell has quickly distinguished herself as one of the rising stars of a new generation of roots musicians. Her first two albums, Boundary County (self-released, 2006) and Letters from Sinners and Strangers (Signature Sounds, 2007) were astonishingly assured efforts, which matched Jewell's understated yet insightful songs with a rugged blend of Americana styles. They were met with a great deal of acclaim, with No Depression raving Jewell is showing she can wander with the best of them, and write riveting song-stories about her adventures along the way. Indicative of Jewell's strong following in Europe, The Word in the U.K. described her as A voice of real distinction [that] manages to transcend some powerful influences and pierce the fog long enough for her own point of view to emerge. (amazon.com)
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It's hard to tell where the traditional ends and the original begins in the music of Eilen Jewell, a sweet-voiced young singer who steeps her material in the hard times of old, reviving the stories and musical styles of the Depression. On her own Rich Man's World, she casts herself as a lonely rambler girl while conjuring comparisons with Gillian Welch. Another original, In the End, sounds uncannily like Lucinda Williams, while a revival of Eric Andersen's train-hopping Dusty Boxcar Wall and the double-entendre blues of the traditional If You Catch Me Stealing, reinforce the sense of Jewell as a musical throwback to a time before she was born. Yet there are timeless pleasures here as well: a bittersweet reading of Charlie Rich's Thanks a Lot, an understated, harmony-laden rendition of Bob Dylan's Walking Down the Line, the sultry cantina twang of her original Too Hot to Sleep. When the musical arrangements aren't generic Hot Club and the songs seem more like role-playing, Jewell sounds like a singer with enough promise to develop her own identity. (Don McLeese)
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Eilen Jewell - Letters from sinners & strangers 2007
(Signature Sounds Recordings)
1. Rich man's world
2. Dusty boxcar wall
3. High shelf booze
4. Thanks a lot
5. Heartache Boulevard
6. Too hot to sleep
7. Where they never say your name
8. How long
9. In the end
10. If you catch me stealing
11. Walking down the line
12. Blue highway
Eilen Jewell, vocals
Jason Beck, drums, background vocals
Daniel Keller, violin
Jerry Miller, guitars
Johnny Sciascia, bass